Thursday, August 04, 2011

Charity Begins at Home

Here's one of those chain e-mails that is making the rounds. Dana Mathewson kindly forwards it to us.

An "Entitlement???"

What on earth is wrong here?

Remember, not only did you contribute to Social Security but your employerdid too. It totaled 15% of your income before taxes. If you averaged only30K over your working life, that's close to $220,500. If you calculate thefuture value of $4,500 per year (yours & your employer's contribution) at asimple 5% (less than what the govt. pays on the money that it borrows),after 49 years of working (me) you'd have $892,919.98. If you took out only3% per year, you receive $26,787.60 per year and it would last better than30 years, and that's with no interest paid on that final amount on deposit!If you bought an annuity and it paid 4% per year, you'd have a lifetimeIncome of $2,976.40 per month. The folks in Washington have pulled off abigger Ponzi scheme than Bernie Madoff ever had.

In the last months we have provided aid to Haiti, Chile, and Turkey. And nowPakistan home of bin Laden. Literally, BILLIONS of DOLLARS!!!

Our retired seniors living on a 'fixed income' receive no aid nor do theyget any breaks while our government and religious organizations pourHundreds of Billions of $$$$$$'s and Tons of Food to Foreign Countries!

They call Social Security and Medicare an entitlement even though most of ushave been paying for it all our working lives and now when its time for usto collect, the government is running out of money. Why did the governmentborrow from it in the first place?

We have hundreds of adoptable children who are shoved aside to make room forthe adoption of foreign orphans.

AMERICA: a country where we have homeless without shelter, children going tobed hungry, elderly going without 'needed' meds, and mentally ill withouttreatment -etc,etc.

YET......................They have a 'Benefit' for the people of Haiti on 12 TV stations, ships andplanes lining up with food, water, tents clothes, bedding, doctors andmedical supplies.

Imagine if the *GOVERNMENT* gave 'US' the same support they give to othercountries.

SAD?

YEAH, OK, SO WHEN DO WE GET MAD ENOUGH

DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT?????99% won't have the guts to forward this.

I'm one of the 1% -- I Just Did

End

A NOTE FROM TIM:

I live in an area with a large Bosnian/Albanian population. The parts of St. Louis where the immigrants settled were dying before they came, because the Americans who lived there were generally blue-collar and were underserved by local businesses. Many moved to better (read newer) areas and the government, in an effort to avoid these places becoming ghetto, settled the Bosnians and Albanians.

That's fine, but what happened next is what I find annoying; these immigrants began opening businesses by the droves. It's wonderful; all sorts of new restaurants, bars, shops, services in the old half empty spaces. But they didn't just decide out of the blue to open those places; it takes money and help manuevering the bureaucratic maze. Where did that money and help come from?

You guessed it. When it was just native-born Americans the money wasn't available, but suddenly it comes flooding in when these foreigners settle. Low or no interest loans, many forgivable, suddenly appear out of nowhere, making these penniless refugees suddenly doing very well. And, since it was Clinton who opened the door for them and it's the government that makes their success possible now, they are loyal Democrats to a man.

I'm happy for their success, but why are we giving money to people who have never paid taxes while that money isn't available to native born citizens?

This is part and parcel with the whole leftist mentality; we help everyone but our own in this country. Frankly, these programs really shouldn't be paid for by taxpayers to begin with - neither for immigrants nor for native born. What should happen is the government should get out of the way, let businesses flourish and lenders will make those loans themselves.

Oh, and a great many of these Bosnians and Albanians are Muslim, and do not believe in paying interest. I suspect these loans are interest free to conform with their religion. I can't get a deal half as good.Why should they?